My Life With A Hooligan
by halabala33
Summary: In the summer time, I met a stranger. We fell in love and for him I have stayed. But after the perfect summer came the bitter and unforgiving November rain.
1. Chapter 1

Ten fifteen. A Saturday night. And the tap drips under the strip light. And I'm sitting in the kitchen sink. I get up and turn the music off. Sarah said that listening to sad music when you are sad helps, but I guess it is just another thing she was wrong about. This hits home too close. I _am_ sitting in the kitchen and the water _does_ drip and I _am_ waiting for the telephone to ring.

"It _is_ always the same, Robert Smith," I say agreeably as I take the CD out and search for the correct case to put it back in. My eyes scan the shelf where piles of CDs are stacked in no particular order. I search for the pink cover. I finally find it. I open the case, put the CD neatly back in, and close the case. The picture on the cover is a weird photography of an old lamp, a small fridge and a hoover. I look around the crappy apartment and ponder. Isn't this exactly what my life has been reduced to? We even have the same lamp. Disgusted, I throw the CD back on the shelf, but I miss and it falls down on the hardwood floor. I leave it there.

At ten twenty-five I decide that maybe I'm tired enough now to fall asleep. Getting up off the black leather couch I notice yet another spot where the leather is peeling off. The place is a bit dark and only the lamp from the cover art of the The Cure album is turned on. I have lived here for five months now, since July, so I don't care if it is dark. I know this place as good as my own hand. I hit my hip bone against the foosball table.

"Shit that hurts," I cry. I wobble into our bedroom as I press the place of impact with my both hands. I collapse on the bed. Not willing to move my body, I crane my neck to almost inhuman angle to see the alarm clock on the nightstand. Ten thirty-four. I reach for my phone and check the display. I purposely kept it in a different room so I wouldn't look at it every 30 seconds. No missed calls. No messages. It is official. I am living a sad life of a sad person. I let out a deep sigh. It makes me think of Pepper, a dog we had when we were kids. On a lazy summer afternoons he would sometimes sigh like that. As if his life was hard. As if he had problems at work and a mortgage to pay. Maybe I should get a dog.

I hear a noise out in the hallway behind the apartment door. I perk up. Is it my boyfriend? Is it a burglar? Whoever you are, by all means come on in. I really need some company. I hear the sound of the key in the lock. The door opens. It is my boyfriend!

I jump out of the bed, forgetting my pain. I run across the living room slash kitchen slash dining room. For a brief moment I consider if I don't seem too pathetic and maybe I should stop, but the kinetic energy makes the decision for me and jump, wrapping my arms around his neck. He catches me and for a moment my feet dangle in the air. He is so tall, my boyfriend. He smells like beer and salt and cigarette smoke and I know I should be repulsed but I'm far from that. My handsome, strong, and athletic boyfriend. My boyfriend with a fresh slash across the eyebrow over his right eye, I notice.

"_That_ is going to leave a scar," I say, pressing my index finger on the wound as I say the word 'that'. He frowns and lets go off me.

"Well now it is." He walks into the kitchen and opens the cupboard over the stove. I sit myself at the breakfast bar and watch him. I don't see any bloodstains on his sweatshirt, but the sweatshirt is grey and it is dark in here.

"Are you okay?" I ask as he closes and opens a different cupboard.

"Yeah, I'm great. Had a couple of beers and couple of gins. A fun night. Bovver went home with Dave's sister, which is hilarious if you ask me."

"Ew." I really did not want to think of nasty Bovver having sex with anyone. I shake my head in an attempt to get rid of the image that my lovely, always helpful brain made up. "That's not what I meant though. I'm asking if you're injured, Pete."

"Of course not, love." He replies lightly. He also keeps looking through the cupboards.

"Pete." I say calmly.

"I have moved all the medicine stuff to bathroom. There is a new box in the cabinet under the sink."

He openes another cupboard and takes a bag of tea out. He puts the kettle on. But he doesn't say anything. He looks at me, and the look is trying to convey the "why on Earth would I need a first aid kit" message, I suppose. I wait for him to say something. He makes tea. We are both trying not to see that his light grey sweatshirt is slowly turning dark in the stomach area. I look down at my own shirt. It is red with blood. His blood.

Drip. Drip. Drip. Drip. Drip.

His hand turned into fist gently thumps on the kitchen counter, as if he is buying himself time, finding courage. We are silent and still, but for his moving hand and I don't know what to do. He is hurt and I really wanted to help, but I know that was the last thing he wants me to do. I feel a lump in my throat and I have to blink a few times to stop the tears before they run down my face.

I decide that it is not worth the fight. I get off the chair and walk into the bedroom. Not looking back, I close the door. Let him play pretend that everything's fine. Everything's normal. Business as usual. I curl on my side of bed. I hear his hurried footsteps as he walks past my door into the bathroom. The cabinet door creaks a bit. I hear the sound of plastic being torn, I hear him spraying the antiseptic, I hear him wince. The walls here really are paper thin.

When he comes to bed minutes later I pretend to be asleep. He normally wears just boxers to bed but he has a black cotton vest on. To cover the wound so I don't freak out, I presume. He gets in bed and presses his chest against my back. His arm reaches around me and I feel his warm breath on my neck. Like a little puppy that has done something wrong he hides his faces in my pillow.

"I'm sorry." He says, almost inaudible. I decide that will suffice. This time.


	2. Chapter 2

I wake up feeling super groggy. I hate mornings with a passion. Maybe one day I will be one of those people who wake up feeling fresh and with a smile on their face. Not today, I guess.

"Shut up!" I yell at the alarm clock that I don't remember setting and slam it with my pillow for a good measure. It falls from the nightstand and continues beeping underneath the bed. I get down on my knees and try to reach it, but it's fallen too far. Resigned, I lie on my back on the dusty floor and stare. Half of the ceiling is inclined and made of glass, which is a terrible material for thermal isolation. I'm cold. It is almost nine o'clock, but it seems that the sun is not up yet. And probably won't be today at all. Raindrops are running down the glass and I shiver.

I hear the bedroom door open and see a pair of bare feet approach me.

"She is up! A Sunday miracle. Awake before noon." He gets down to my level, placing his knees beside my hips and carefully, trying not to spill anything, he places a cup of hot cocoa next to my head. "Good morning, sunshine," he says, with a gentle kiss.

With his arms stretched he hovers over my head and grins.

"What are you doing?"

"Yoga." I say, defiantly. He rolls over to lie by my side. I prop myself up with my elbow and pick the cup up. On this miserable morning I would prefer a cup of coffee but I appreciate the gesture. I take a sip.

"Mmm. Is this cocoffee?" I ask as I take another sip.

"Yes," he answers.

"Mmmm. It's good. Thank you." I say and I kiss him, leaving a brown mark of chocolate and coffee mixture on his lips.

"You have something here." I point to his mouth and he tries to bite my finger. I laugh. He laughs. He licks his lips clean. I want to kiss them again. But I don't. How can I expect him to remember that I am mad at him, when I also keep forgetting?

"How's your wound?" I ask as I take the cup to my mouth for yet another sip.

"Don't," he says sternly with a frown. I look at him intently. Is that all he is going to say? Well now I'm getting really mad.

"Don't what?" I ask.

"Just don't, Nina. Don't start." He says, irritated, and gets up. I finish the cup and place it on the nightstand. Then I think better of it and take the dirty cup to the kitchen and place it in the sink.

"I think _you_ started when you came home and bled all over my top. That is not cool, Pete. Internal injuries are not cool. I just want to know if you are alright. I don't want to find you dead in morning without at least trying to discuss this. I would feel like such an idiot in front of the police. _So Madam, your boyfriend came home with a stab wound and you both ignored it and then you found him dead a day later, is that your official statement? Madam, please follow me to the police station. You are under arrest. _Is that what you want? Do you want me to go to prison?"

He rolls his eyes.

"You are not going to prison," he says, but not to me. He says it to the wall on his right side. Or maybe he is talking to the Frank Lampard poster.

"You are really pissing me off, you know that?" I throw a kitchen towel at him and try to march out of the kitchen but he stops me.

"Alright, alright, keep your Alans on. Look, everything's under control, yeah?" He lifts his shirt up and tears the bandage off. "It's just a flesh wood. A scratch." He laughs. I look at the wound, then at his laughing face, then at his wound, then at his face and I wonder if I'm dating a crazy person. The scratch, as he would call it, was 5 inches long across his abdomen and there was no telling in how deep the wound originally was as it appeared to be glued shut. His laugh slowly vanishes from his face upon seeing my reaction.

"Seriously, it nothing." He tries to persuade me. I'm at loss for words.

"Come on, babe. Say something." He half hugs me, half tries to shake a reassurance out of me that everything's fine.

"Have you used superglue to seal it?" I ask incredulously.

"Yeah," he chuckles. "Liquiband! Works like magic."

I punch him in the chest. "Can you stop laughing? There is nothing funny here! How do you know that it was just a surface wound? Why wouldn't you go see a doctor? And how the hell did it even happen? With a knife? A bottle? An axe?!"

He creeps towards me so we are standing body to body with no inch of air left. He looks me in the eye and says:

"I have the Red Cross First Aid Certificate. I know how to distinguish a surface wound from a serious injury. I stuck my finger inside to see how deep the wound is. It was very shallow and it bled like a motherfucker. I am very sorry that I ruined your tank top. It was a very lovely tank and I will buy you a new one. But you jumped at me without a warning and the sudden movement caused that fresh blood guzzled out. If I get seriously injured I promise I will go to see a doctor immediately. But I won't get seriously injured. I'm Pete Dunham, not some bleeding tart. Now let's take a shower, then we get dressed and I will buy you the best breakfast you ever had in your whole life. Come on." He kisses my forehead, turns around and heads for the bathroom, taking his clothes off and throwing them all over the living room.

"I'm waiting!" he bellows.

"You do look like a bleeding tart right now," I mutter as a last sign of protest, but who am I kidding. I take my pajamas off and hop in the shower. This is just a pause, I tell myself, not the end of discussion.


	3. Chapter 3

It's Monday. I sit by the kitchen table and blow air bubbles through the straw to make my Pepsi flat. I stir occasionally to redistribute the melted ice water so that my drink is more even. I have my purple headphones on and I have seven Word documents opened. I count all the tabs I have opened in Chrome. Twenty-six. This is how I always create the perfect atmosphere for studying. Except I went on youtube to play one song, just one song and only once, I swear, I lied to myself and now it's three in the afternoon and I feel like I have missed the productive hour anyway. After years and years of research I have come to conclusion that my productive hour is 11 AM. Sadly I keep sleeping through it ever since I have moved to London. I would always be up by six before, to have a chance to see Dad before he left for work. Who'd have thought that without him here I would become so lazy so quickly? In theory I'm here to work on my postgraduate degree. In reality I spend my days with funny youtube videos and my nights with Pete and I'm not even sure if I'm all that interested in school anymore.

The front door opens and I jump. Then I realize what I'm doing and I laugh. I take my headphones off.

" 'ello mate," I greet Pete, trying to mock his cockney accent. Although it sounds a bit like I'm mocking my inability to do accents.

"Hi," he smiles at me as he takes his coat off and hangs it on the rack.

"What's funny?" He sits on the chair next to me, grabs some peanuts from the bowl next to my notebook and reads the screen. "Surely not _ecotourism and sustainable development_?"

I grin. "No, not that. It's just that when you came in I automatically pressed ALT and TAB to hide my browser window."

His nose crinkles. "I'm not your Dad, love."

"I know. Just a reflex." He leaves the table and opens the fridge. After few seconds of analyzing the content he takes a plate out.

"How old is this?" he asks, sniffing.

"Thursday I think," I rub my eyes. I'm a bit tired from staring at the computer screen for hours. I might have forgotten to blink. "We can order take out if you want."

"What? I thought I would have home cooked meal three times a day if I get a live-in girlfriend. I feel cheated." He stuffs himself with the cold four day old spaghetti.

"_Charming_," I think as I watch him. Now he's only missing a mustard stain on his shirt and big gut to rest his beer on when watching telly. He takes the plate back to the table. He rubs my chin and chuckles.

"I'm just kidding. I still love you, even if you can't cook. This is atrocious." He points at the plate. He had already eaten a half of it, yet he's complaining. I try to take it away from him, but he is too quick.

"No! I'm hungry!" He escapes and sits on the couch to eat in peace. He turns the TV on. The sports channel, of course. But he is not looking at the TV, he is looking at me.

"So what did you do today, love?" He asks and actually sounds really interested in what my answer will be.

"I watched youtube," I answer truthfully.

"Oh, you found any good documentaries on ecotourism?"

My poor naïve baby. He thinks I was doing some actual work.

"I watched Noel Fielding," I mutter. He has turned his back to me as something on TV caught his attention. He doesn't answer and I start to think he didn't hear me. Which is good. The reporter stops speaking and they switch to commercials. He gets up and takes the plate back to the kitchen. He puts it in the sink on top of dirty dishes from yesterday and runs hot water over it. Then he dries his hands with kitchen towel. Just as I think that the discussion is over and I can continue to do nothing he asks:

"What did you say you were watching?"

_Damn. _I cringe as I repeat my answer. He looks at me and he looks very concerned.

"Bouncy bouncy?" He asks in a serious tone. "That's how you spend your days?"

I'm wearing his Adidas hoodie. I put the hood over my head and hide my face. I'm invisible.

"Please, don't guilt trip me!"

He laughs quietly as walks over to me. "You poor creature."

He pats my back. "There, there," he says not unkindly. Then he changes into his workout clothes, puts his running shoes on and leaves me there. I take a nap.

He wakes me up some time later. He brought dinner, too. I love him.

"I love you," I say.

"I love you too, bug," he says matter-of-factly and hands me my thai shrimp and noodles. We eat on the couch. I gobble it down and finish my flat Pepsi. Then I lay down with my head in his lap. He caresses my hair.

"I don't think I want to do the school stuff anymore," I murmur.

He keeps stroking my head.

"Yeah, I figured."

"But then I'd had to find a job," I continue.

"That's what adults do."

His fingers play with the loose strands of my hair.

"I'm not sure if I can adult properly, yet." I voice my concern.

"Babe, I assure you, millions of people do it every day. If they can do it, you can do it. Don't a self-indulgent sloth. It doesn't become you."

"But I don't know what I want to be when I grow up."

"Just pick something."

"It's easy for you to say. You love to teach!" I turn around so I can see his face. He does not expect my sudden movement and stabs me in the eye.

"My sweet little princess," he snickers as he kisses my eye to take the pain away. It does not help. "How pampered are you?"

I'm not going to argue. I admit I have it pretty good. My Dad was a professional athlete and he did make _very_ good money. Also he was feeling guilty that mom left us, so he was also _very_ generous. But I have a suspicion that even he would stop funding me if I quit school.

"A lot," I acknowledge. Then it occurs to me and I sit up. "So you don't like teaching?"

He shrugs. "It pays the rent."

I think.

"So, if money were no object, and if you ignored all the comments from your friends and family, what would you like to do?"

He considers the question. Then he looks at me weirdly.

"What?" I ask.

"I have never said it out loud."

"You can tell me."

"I know it will not happen. And I didn't need to hear anyone say it."

"You're only twenty-seven. You can still be anything or anyone you want. Except for a violin player, I think, or an Olympic gymnast. But other than that, I'd say go for it."

He smirks. "Life is so easy for Nina Zedniks of the world, innit."

"Oh, come on. Low blow. How about we make a pact. Each of us will think really hard for five minutes and then write down a profession, something you really, really, really want to do for a living. And then we will help each other to make a real plan how to reach said profession. Because I love you and I want you to be happy. And I want to be happy to. This is no way to live," I gesture towards the filthy kitchen and the living room that was the opposite of cozy and nicely decorated. "This is how depressed people with no goals live. That's not us."

I wait for his response. At first he looks incredibly skeptical but after a moment he gets up and brings two pens and a sheet of paper.

"Fuck it. Let's do it." He tears the paper in half. He hands me the pen and one half of the paper. He writes down a word immediately. I think. And I think some more. I can hear my brain buzzing. _Think of professions, think of professions. What do I like to do? Watch TV. Read books. Surf internet. Working in one of those would be great._ Then it comes to my mind and I write down a word victoriously.

I hand him my paper and he hands me his. On one, two, three we read it. It's the same word.

"Okay, so we have a goal then," I say, trying to sound confident. I take the two pieces of paper and pin them on the corkboard over Pete's desk.

"A writer," reads on both.

We gaze at the board, feeling the significance of this moment. He turns to me and in his face I can see the question _I _wanted to ask.

"Now what?" we say in unison.


End file.
